The History Of Jews In America, Sacher,

A History of the Jew in America, Howard M. Sacher, c. 1993.

Prologue

Takes a Jewish family in Illinois, starting in 1865, and tracks their family history and movements for the next several generations to give readers a sense of the magnitude of the Jewish story in America. Simply a "fun" way to begin this very, very huge book --- 936 pages.

Chapter 1: A foothold in the early Amereicas

Begins with Spain, King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella, Christopher Columbus, and then moves to Portugal, and then Brazil.

Spain, 1492: four million citizens; one million of them were Jewish.

conversos: baptized Jews
marranos: secretly-professing Jews

From the Iberian peninsula to the Netherlands. 

Dutch West Indies.

But did not last. Portugal re-took Recife.

Fourteen vessels with Jews departed. Twelve back to the Netherlands; two to the Dutch West Indies: Windward Islands and in the Leeward Islands of Saint Eustatius, Saba, and Saint Martin, in Aruba and  Curaçao.

Netherland Antilles.

The colonies on the eve of 1776:
Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Hampshire: Congregationalist, the Americn version of English :uritan

Maryland: initially Catholic.

Virginia, Georgia and South Carolina: British Anglicanism 

Jews and usually Catholics denied political equality.

New York, later: Shearith Israel congregation.

By 1718: constables in three of NY's seven wards were Jewish.

Much better accepted than the Roman Catholics.

Dour New England: things were much different.